README – Replication Materials for: From Social Proximity to Policy Preferences: Contact with Drug Market Participants and Citizens’ Attitudes Toward Drug Policy

Authors: Daniel Zizumbo-Colunga & Pamela Ruiz Flores López  
Journal: Public Opinion Quarterly  
Software used: Stata v18.5  

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1. Overview

This replication package includes all necessary materials to reproduce the analyses presented in the article: "From Social Proximity to Policy Preferences: Contact with Drug Market Participants and Citizens’ Attitudes Toward Drug Policy". The study uses individual-level data from the Latinobarómetro surveys conducted in 2011, 2013, and 2015. The script performs data cleaning, transformation, and statistical analysis using Stata v18.5.

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2. Contents of the Package

- **Latinobarometro_2011_esp.dta**  
  Raw dataset from the Latinobarómetro 2011 survey (Spanish version).

- **Latinobarometro2013.dta**  
  Raw dataset from the Latinobarómetro 2013 survey (Spanish version).

- **Latinobarometro_2015_esp.dta**  
  Raw dataset from the Latinobarómetro 2015 survey (Spanish version).

- **Replication_do.do**  
  Stata script containing all code for data cleaning, construction of variables, dataset merging, modeling, and table/figure generation.

- **Codebook_Latinobarometro_2011.pdf**
  Codebook for the dataset from the Latinobarómetro 2011 survey.

- **Codebook_Latinobarometro_2013.pdf**
  Codebook for the dataset from the Latinobarómetro 2013 survey.

- **Codebook_Latinobarometro_2015.pdf**
  Codebook for the dataset from the Latinobarómetro 2015 survey.

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3. How to Replicate

**Step 1.** Open Stata 18.5  
**Step 2.** Set the global path inside the "Replication_do.do" file to the location where all files are stored on your computer (search for the line that begins with "global data").  
**Step 3.** Run the entire "Replication_do.do" script. It will:
   - Load the original datasets,
   - Clean and recode relevant variables,
   - Combine the data from 2011, 2013, and 2015,
   - Generate all final variables,
   - Perform the statistical analyses reported in the article,
   - Generate figures. 

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4. Data Source and Use

The datasets from Latinobarómetro are publicly available at:  
**https://www.latinobarometro.org/**  
All data files included here were downloaded directly from the official source and are redistributed under the conditions of public use for research purposes. The original respondent ID variables (e.g., "idenpa") are retained in each dataset to allow for cross-validation or further replication.

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5. Notes

- This package assumes basic familiarity with Stata.
- If any version issues arise (e.g., due to "rangestat" or other commands), please ensure you are using Stata v18.5 or update user-written packages via "ssc install" as needed.

